Home › Blogs › NY College Dems's blog ›

Anatomy of a Remix

In a diary on MyDD, Adam Conner dissects the viral spread of the "Obama"1984 Apple Remix ad, showing how this phenomenon spread. Even more interesting than this anatomy of a remix, he also manages to find a nugget of wisdom in the reporting of Time Magazine's Joe Klein:

This is pretty amazing, and very effective, I think. It's increasingly apparent that the Great Divide in 2008 isn't black v. white, or male v. female, but young v. old.

By the way, I could put together a reel of Obama sound bites that sounds every bit as trite as Hillary in this guerrilla mashup. But I wouldn't have the skills or sensibility to do it this way; very few in my generation would. I disagreed--quietly, in a loyal and seemly fashion--with Time's Person of the Year last December. But ads like this one, which will have an impact on this campaign, indicate that I was wrong. You are, apparently, not only the Person of the Year, but also the Political Consultants of the future. Wonder how Hillary's paid help will respond.

Sounds about right. Only I'd add this - it's not just young people. We'll probably end up leading this charge, but eventually this will be the province of all people.

Bookmark/Search this post with:
  • Delicious
  • Digg
  • StumbleUpon
  • Propeller
  • Reddit
  • Magnoliacom
  • Newsvine
  • Furl
  • Facebook
  • Google
  • Yahoo
  • Technorati
  • Icerocket
March 20th, 2007 4:21am
Tags:

Comment viewing options

Select your preferred way to display the comments and click "Save settings" to activate your changes.

1984

Submitted by Josh Koenig on Tue, 2007-03-20 07:48.

I have some suspicion that the 1984 remix was done by professionals. Doesn’t mean they weren’t young, but that is very high-quality work that uses some very rare footage. The lady w/the hammer has an iPod, the footage for which was used only in a Steve Jobs keynote presentation and it isn’t generally available.

On the other hand, it’s worth remembering what Dr. Wolliner was able to whip out back in 2004:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqIRQ…

not that tough to do

Submitted by jpb on Tue, 2007-03-20 08:30.

A quick google search [[http://www.boreme.com/boreme/funny-2004/m_1984-p4.php|yields]] the footage, and all you need to do is throw Hillary on the screen. Mixing the sound (recording footsteps to match the video) would be the hardest part. Its about an afternoon’s worth of work.

It is a pretty high-quality video, but I think that’s a testament to how powerful the consumer/prosumer level tools have become.

Ahhh

Submitted by Josh Koenig on Tue, 2007-03-20 19:44.

I was under the impression that the video hadn’t made it out online. Well, in that case, there’s zero reason to think it’s anything other than a talented amateur.

1984 Production Notes

Submitted by jpb on Thu, 2007-03-22 05:58.

[[http://www.huffingtonpost.com/phil-de-vellis-aka-parkridge/i-made-the-vote-differenb43989.html|Here’s]] the story. Phil de Vellis, (formerly) of Blue State Digital, made the ad on his own.

I made the “Vote Different” ad because I wanted to express my feelings about the Democratic primary, and because I wanted to show that an individual citizen can affect the process. There are thousands of other people who could have made this ad, and I guarantee that more ads like it—by people of all political persuasions—will follow…I made the ad on a Sunday afternoon in my apartment using my personal equipment (a Mac and some software), uploaded it to YouTube, and sent links around to blogs…This ad was not the first citizen ad, and it will not be the last. The game has changed.

Looks about right. Except for the fact that he felt he had to resign from Blue State Digital. This, plus the Edwards blogger flap is a little disturbing to me. Too many high-profile conversational-media-crossing-over-to-establishment scalps in too short a time.

Do bloggers and vloggers need rules of engagement for going “legit” without getting burned?

fwiw

Submitted by Jake Thorn on Wed, 2007-03-21 12:41.

rothenberg [[http://rothenbergpoliticalreport.blogspot.com/2007/03/impact-of-hillary-1984.html|doesn’t think much of Tubes]].

fortunately, he’s [[http://www.losethelabel.org/node/300|full of shit]].

[[http://www.losethelabel.org/user/3|-6.00, -4.15]]